Comparative study of measurement accuracy of two digital spiral and digital linear tomography with CBCT in implant treatment plan

Statement of the problem: In order to replace lost tooth of patients, we use dental implants which are common. Therefore, accurate measuring of bone height and width before placing implants is necessary. The aim of this study is evaluating the accuracy of linear and spiral tomography in careful determination of implant site sizes in comparison with gold standard (CBCT). This study is survey of methods and in it, the height and width of regions in maxilla and 8 regions of mandible were measured in two dimensions of bone height and width in a dry skull using linear and spiral tomography. Then, this skull was scanned using CBCT and real sizes of required distances specified on bone cross-section and compared with spiral and linear tomographic sections. Regarding differences in recorded amounts in measurement of every region (by each of imaging systems), one-way ANOVA statistical test showed no significant differences in accuracy of imaging systems in comparison with each other (p<0.05). There were no significant differences in system accuracy by height and width. Spiral tomography, in comparison with gold standard (CBCT) resulted in overestimations for measurements of upper and lower jaws. However; linear tomography underestimated (in comparison with CBCT data) the measurements of the lower jaw. Although accuracy of linear and spiral tomography is not same with CBCT in determining size of jaw bone, dental tomography could be used in the study of cross-section of short edentulous regions.